


the book

by bombcollar



Category: Dark Souls III
Genre: Family, Gen, really fucking sad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-02
Updated: 2017-12-02
Packaged: 2019-02-09 09:14:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,036
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12884730
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bombcollar/pseuds/bombcollar
Summary: Velka returns for something long lost.





	the book

**Author's Note:**

> This is crossposted to my tumblr as well (ersatzsun).  
> Velka being Gwyndolin's mother is one of my favorite headcanons!

Snow lights on her eyelashes, and Yorshka blinks it away, her vision going blurry for a moment. It seemed like that was all she had, moments, the days and weeks of her imprisonment blurring together. She remembered her life before now, before the Pontiff had torn her family to scraps and left her here, awaiting an uncertain fate. He'd told her how the Dark Sun had abandoned her, fled like the coward that she was, but Yorshka could not bring herself to believe him. Gwyndolin would never abandon her... but if that were true, then where was she? Also imprisoned? Or...

Her lip trembles as she takes in a shaky breath. No, she mustn't consider such a thing. She had an important job to do, she had to be strong. Yorshka looks down at her feet, at the tail curled around herself in a feeble attempt to preserve her warmth. Her scales had once been a lovely lavender color, the color of the Dark Sun's lunar magic, but they'd become so pale, soon she would be the same color as the snow surrounding her tower. It felt like losing Gwyndolin all over again.

The view never changed, the same mountain ranges and the distant peaks of Lothric castle. Yorshka wore no chains, and the tower she sat upon led down into her church below, and to the streets of Irithyll. The fact of the matter was, though, that even if she evaded the Pontiff's knights, she simply had nowhere to go. She was too weak to travel far or to defend herself. Though her dragon blood kept her from death, her body had withered from hunger, and even standing for too long left her lightheaded. 

A guttural croak interrupts the icy silence, and her head shoots up. There's a crow perched on the railing of her balcony, dark and glossy. Her first thought, to her slight shame, is  _maybe I can catch and eat it._   She licks her dry lips. No, she shouldn't be ashamed, not when she was this hungry. Her shaky fingers reach for a small pile of stones beneath her chair, prisms left by the few Darkmoon Blades who'd passed though, and she offers them to the bird in hopes of fooling it into hopping closer.

The bird is a bird for one moment, but the next, it is a woman... Or something suggestive of a woman, tall and cloaked in darkness, long black hair tumbling to her chest from the chasm of her hood. Yorshka gapes, her pale eyes wide as the woman extends a hand, curved black talons and fingers scaled like the feet of a raven. 

Gwyndolin had taught her of Velka, the Goddess of Sin... A dubious deity that as a rule did not involve herself in the doings of other gods, and most importantly, Gwyndolin's mother. However, Gwyndolin was no exception to the rule, and Velka had not been present for much of the Dark Sun's life, and none of Yorshka's until this point... Why would she appear now?

Yorshka opens her mouth to ask, but Velka speaks first, her voice like the rustle of folding wings. "My book."

"Y... your book?" 

"Yes, child." 

Her book... The Book of the Guilty, that must be it. Gwyndolin had given it to Yorshka during one of their last meetings, her fingers pale against the dark leather of its cover. She had meant to gift it when the girl was older, more capable of understanding the weight of her duty, but there simply wasn't time. Even if the Dark Sun fell, order must be kept. Sinners must be punished. Yorshka looks back to her chair, where the book was resting against the wall behind it. She reaches for it, then stops. "...I'm sorry, I cannot give it to you. I promised Gwyndolin I would lead the Blades. I... Lady Velka, please, if we could only talk-"

"The book was stolen from me, long ago. You have no right to it." Her claws twitch, beckoning. 

Yorshka feels hot tears begin to gather in her eyes. This goddess, her adoptive grandmother... She'd finally appeared, not to offer Yorshka help, not to express sympathy at her plight, but to demand her _book_ back. This book that was one of the few scraps of Gwyndolin Yorshka might have left. She knew Velka was detached, but this was simply  _unkind_. "...no. I will not." Her tiny, sharp nails dig little furrows into its ancient hide. "Please... Lady Velka, she’s is in danger, we have to save her. The Pontiff, he... he's imprisoned her. He's killed most of the Blades, the Knightess, and everybody in the city..." Her voice rises, her scrawny chest hitching. "You're a god, can't you help?"

"I do not involve myself in the Dark Sun's affairs," Velka says softly, beginning to draw her fingers back, realizing that the girl would not be giving up the book upon request. "Nor her... children's. If you will not return my rightful possessions, then I have no business here. The Book of the Guilty will find its way back to me, sooner or later. I merely hoped this would be an easier time than the last." 

"You’re her  _mother_..." Yorshka's voice cracks as she begins to stand. "Please... please, don't leave me here! I have to help her!" She grasps for Velka's hand, but her fingers pass through, as if the goddess were only smoke. In frustration and grief, she lashes out, swiping for the dark space where Velka's face would be, but the result is the same, and she clutches the book to her chest, sobbing. She can feel her tears already beginning to cool on her cheeks.  

The goddess, once more a crow, takes wing and quickly vanishes into the mists. Yorshka collapses back onto her chair, wrapping her arms around the book and trembling, without the energy to cry like she wanted to. In several centuries, perhaps the Goddess of Sin would pry it from the arms of her frozen corpse, but for now this ragged tome was all Yorshka had of her dear guardian. All she could hold, touch and remember with. A book, a chime, and the fading color of her scales.


End file.
